OFD Summer Webinar: Building a Certified Peer Observation Program: Improving Teaching and Removing Biases

Are you applying for tenure/promotion or undergoing post-tenure review? Are you an administrator evaluating faculty teaching? There are inherent flaws in the sole use of Student Evaluations of Teaching (SETs) to measure teaching efficacy- so how do you balance tenure and promotion portfolios with other forms of evidence? The Center for Teaching, Learning, and Leadership at the University of North Georgia (UNG) is planning a Certified Peer Observation Program designed to be a non-threatening way to improve teaching through peer feedback from a fully trained observer. Faculty can use the observation as an alternative and unbiased metric to balance SETs. We will provide a preliminary overview of the system under development at UNG, will offer suggestions for how to incorporate peer observations into teaching portfolios, and we encourage participants to bring their own ideas to share.